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ISM enters Jenin refugee camp

Tonight, five members of the International Solidarity Movement are sleeping at a school in Jenin with 800 refugees from the Jenin Refugee Camp. Earlier in the day, nine internationals from the United States, Sweden and Italy entered the refugee camp and started to deliver food to the remaining residents of the camp - women, children and elderly men. After 10 minutes of walking one team came across an injured elderly woman trapped in the rubble of her half-demolished home. She had been stuck there for days. The internationals helped her escape and carried the woman out and towards the city and the hospital. Soldiers attempted to prevent the removal of the woman, threw dishes and glasses from one house out the window and at the group, and also tried to prevent a stretcher from being brought in to carry the woman, but internationals managed to walk past the soldiers and get the woman to safety.

While at the hospital, 7 bodies were brought in to the morgue, each body charred beyond recognition. One team of internationals reported seeing bodies lying amid the ruins of destroyed homes, noting the smell of the rotting and decomposing flesh, creating a major health risk for those still living in the camp. One international counted 14 bodies she saw in her movement around one area of the camp.

Internationals walked through areas of the camp that had been ìmassively bulldozedî - homes destroyed with a wide swath of road cut through homes. Dozens of homes lie flat in ruin, while many others are partially destroyed, leaving the remainder of the homes exposed to the elements. Many people inside the camp remain without food and water, as aid agencies are still prohibited from entering the camp.

In Jenin city tonight, internationals report that two tanks are moving up and down one of the main streets, firing tank shells in opposite directions indiscriminately into the city. Additionally, heavy machine gun fire is reported coming from the gun turrets on the tanks.